Walking on Thunder
by Phoenix Oblivion
Summary: In the city of Dilenus, the general public is haunted by reports of four gangs shooting and fighting on the streets. But one ginger haired boy named Jake is curious of their activity, and when he discovers that one of his best friends at school is being trained by the Gang of Thunder to be a warrior, he begins to investigate... and finds more than he bargained for.
1. Prologue

Prologue

There, standing in the outline of the moonlight, were the Redwood trees. There was a narrow road, bending like a boarder line, stretching between the massive expanse of grass from the park and the endless towers and buildings of Dilenus' inner alleyways. A large, black metal fence stood between the road and the Redwood trees that stood alone; only the gang of Thunder and Water knew how to get through it without breaking the lock of the entrance gate. Beyond this was a river, cold and uninviting; beyond that, yet more grass. And now, the small gap between the metal and trees were being used by Red, the deputy of the Gang of Thunder. He was a large, muscled twenty year old with dark red hair, but you couldn't see through the bandana he wore.

Shuffling his feet, he turned to the other teenagers and adults behind him. "Ready?" They all nodded. Red nodded back to them, and he drew his gun to the air, and fired.

The trees exploded with gunfire; the screeching of blood falling to the ground ran through their ears, he could see his gang taking cover behind the trees, and attempting to push the Water gang invaders back into their quarter of the city. Ducking behind the cover of the Redwood trees, he begun to fire upon the River gang invaders. Bullets smashed into the bark, leaving yet more upon the rough edges. He was being attacked by two of them, their fire hitting his cover mercilessly, but Red got the last laugh- knowing with instinct, and the power of his years in the training centre, when the warriors would cease their fire to re-cock their guns. Then his gun slipped around the tree and fired. The Code of Honour slipped into his mind immediately, and instead of aiming for their heads, he smashed two bullets inches away from their torsos, giving them warning to disappear back towards their ranks. Suddenly, he saw Oak, the vicious deputy of the River gang. He was throwing knives directly at two of his warriors, and they were struggling to keep up with his practised movements. Red was about to bring his fire upon Oak when suddenly, there was Tiger, a knife slipped out of his pocket just as sharp as Oak's, and he leaped across the cloud of bullets and onto the body of Oak.

"Oak! How dare you walk on our grounds. The Redwood trees belong to the gang of Thunder!" Tiger's rage echoed across the trees, but Oak merely laughed.

"After tonight, Tiger, this will just be another _River_ gang part of the city!" Oak's head turned to watch about ten more people emerge from a nearby river and begin firing at the Thunder gang warriors. They emerged like otters, their skin showed no signs of bitterness towards the freezing water, and their bandana's dripping blackish droplets.

Tiger voiced his thoughts. "You may swim like otters, but you and your warriors don't belong in the trees!" His gun slipped towards Oak's head but the River gang deputy just laughed harder.

Knowing Tiger's sometimes fatal bursts of anger, he leapt forward with just as much grace through the shower of death and towards the muscled, brown haired Thunder gang warrior. His hand slipped onto Tiger's shoulder, bringing him round to look at him. "Don't kill him Tiger, it's against the Code of Honour! And we are already outnumbered." Leaving Tiger to let Oak up, he turned to the side of the battle currently occupied by the The Gang of Thunder's warriors. "Retreat Thunder! Retreat!"

For a moment, they looked at him to see if they had heard correctly, but then remembering the amount of authority Red had over them, they dashed back to the secret entrance and back into the shadows of the alleys. Red followed their steps, waiting for Tiger to catch up, and as soon as they had all disappeared through, he disappeared with them back into the safety of the alleyways...

* * *

The main shopping area of Dilenus seemed to stretch endlessly, occupied by twelve storey shops. Food stores, entertainment, all the general publics wants were sold on Fusion Street, but perhaps the most eye catching building of this place was the skyscraper named The Truhden Bank, after it's founder. Its glass was shining in moonlight, and the street lamps beside the building gave it a gleaming, enigmatic glow. It was ten storeys high, so perhaps a little smaller than the others, but much more... mysterious.

Something the general public didn't know was that the top floor flat was occupied by the great Blue herself. Truhden was an anagram of the word thunder. Because you see, Truhden Bank wasn't a bank, in fact, for from it. It was the headquarters of the gang of Thunder, or just Thunder gang for short. The gang of Thunder weren't crooks, definitely not what the press would define as "criminals". They didn't go around shooting at public people, they shot at other gangs whilst trying to defend what was rightfully there's; they had a religion they protected with their life and a Code of Honour laid down by their ancestors when the great city of Dilenus' first foundations were laid down. And so much more than BBC One would have you believe. The thing that made them Public Enemy Number One in the eyes of the cameras was how they were armed and extremely dangerous.

And all of the orders came right from the top floor of "Truhden Bank". Only very important, high status people in the gang such as Red and Spot went to the top floor. And when they were up their, it was no short of amazing. Blue lived in luxury, with high quality paintings and furniture that would be the apple of even the richest person's eyes. She was sort of beautiful as well, her sky-blue eyes fitted in with the silky hair perfectly, and her slender body made her only more attractive. Not only this, but she was actually the best shot in all of the four gangs. And Spot, the Thunder gang's doctor, was almost as pretty as her leader.

At the time of midnight, when her most of her gang had retire to their own houses, Blue stood at the window of her study, watching the endless stars in the night sky. At that moment, she opened the window, almost as if to let their glow bring her up with them. Suddenly, she heard the elevator doors open and she turned to see Spot, with her usual doctor's lab coat on, walking in, her head bowed. "Good evening-"

Blue waved her hand, shaking of the greeting. "How is Brown?"

Spot watched her intently. "The knife wound is deep Blue, but she is young and strong: she will heal quickly."

"And the others?"

"They will all recover too."

Blue stepped around from her desk and into the entrance wall of her flat, sighing. "We are extremely lucky not to have lost any of our warriors in this fight. The Gang of River desperately wanted the Redwood trees, and we were powerless to stop them." Turning away to look back at the stars, she continued. "I am deeply troubled by tonight's defeat. The Gang of Thunder has not lost any of our territory since I became their leader. These are very difficult times for our gang. There have been so few new children born into Thunder gang raised families..."

"There will be more on the way, Snow phoned me the other day and reported that she is pregnant again-"

"Perhaps, but raising kids and showing them the Religion of Stars _and_ training them to shoot and defend themselves takes months... have the Stars spoken to you?" Blue interrupted

"Not for some time."

Blue watched the stars contemptuously for some moments, before she heard Spot shriek with pain behind her. "What is wrong!" she shouted.

"It- it was a message from The Stars!" she gasped. "They told me- they told me... that fire alone can save the Gang of Thunder."


	2. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: As you can, see chapter two is finally here! The third will come up much quicker, please read and review!**

* * *

From his hiding place, Jake could see several police guards wrapping yellow tape around the trees. It didn't worry him though, nothing was going to stop him from getting to the Redwood Trees today. It was the second time in one month that the south gang and the north gang had fought over this area and this time- _this time_ Jake was determined to fine some debris of the fight. Perhaps a flick-knife or a bullet that had fallen to floor... just something that the police had missed. The ginger haired thirteen year old checked his watch, and smiled immediately- he had been away for ten minutes, meaning that his mother had probably broken into hysterics by now-

Unfortunately, he would probably get banned from scanning the news for activity when he cam back... oh well. When he looked up, he knew that the coast was clear, so he ran forward, threw the tape over his head and ducked behind the nearest of the Redwood Trees and- YES! The police didn't seem! His heart beat a little faster as he started to look around the bark that had fallen from the tree, it was like they were scarred, each bullet that cracked around the area seemed to make the trees look just a little older and wiser. They were permanently chipped his knife wounds and bullet holes, and maybe, if he just looked hard enough, he would find would he had been trying to find for years-

One of the guns used by the gangs.

And that was exactly what he found. Gasping, he noticed the glint of metal down on the grass next to the tree he stood by. It was in the shadow of the very tree that he stood, and around where the bullets that seemed to have fallen from the barrel, perhaps it was broken? He picked it up to see it was almost in mint condition if a little dirty. Jake knew a good few things about guns, and he knew that this model was an absolutely beautiful Browning Hi-Power 9mm semi-automatic handgun. He placed all the bullets he could find back into the chamber and cocked it neatly. Belgium in origin, but what surprised him most was that this had just been left on the floor, disregarded. Perhaps someone had found a better gun... but what could be better than this? Beautiful make and amazing grip- it felt perfect in his hand. Almost without a second thought he stuffed it into his pocket so that it could not be seen- and- with one last check round the tree, dashed back into the bush which he had hidden before. He felt triumphant, absolutely elated. He had found something that had been held, and _used_ by the gangs. Someone had fired it at the enemy, actually grasped it and pulled their finger around the trigger. It was- it was better than amazing! Finally, he was one step closer to finding the gangs.

And maybe even joining one. That thought made him feel even more warm inside... he didn't know why, but he felt like he was _supposed_ to be in a gang. Some feeling that burned inside, a huge and unstoppable desire... he had even had strange dreams. The same one every night, he remembered.

* * *

_Jake could see himself. There, right in front of him. He couldn't see his face, it was hidden in the bandana, but he felt certain that it was him. A gun was in his hand, he recognised it as a Browning Hi-Power 9mm semi-automatic handgun, and he was leading all the others through a small gap in the park fence he had never noticed before. It was strange, the other Jake looked so much older, so much more confident than he was now. He was muscled and the younger Jake he wouldn't be able to pull that trigger underneath the barrel of the gun. The younger Jake almost immediately admired him, he, he, he wanted to be just like him._

* * *

He smiled at the memory, knowing that one day, he knew that he would be like that. He didn't know what it was, but the dream, it was almost like it was some kind of prophecy. Jake didn't believe in god, but something made him believe in this dream like nothing he had ever believed was true before. Still with a huge grin plastered over his face, Jake rushed across the road and through the closed door of his house...

**The Next Day**

As he predicted, Jake was banned from scanning the TV for gang activity, but really, he didn't care, because he could just check the BBC website on the computer: it was always chock full of juicy reports! He smiled on his way to school, he didn't know what it was, but something had given him a strange instinct... something really bad. Bad enough to make him bring his gun to school, he could feel practically feel the weight of it, he knew it wasn't heavy, but his bag suddenly felt like it weighed a ton. Just feeling more and more nervous, he wiped the sweat of his brow, turned and walked into the school gate. And, again, my eyes met perhaps the most boring school he had ever seen. For a massively modern city such as Dilenus, this had to be the most unfashionable, un-cool place he had ever seen. It was called Brickwall High... even the _name_ was _exceedingly_ boring.

Suddenly, the boy's ears pricked up and he turned to see his best friend, Jayden, walking towards him. "Hi Jake! How you doing?"

Jake's eyes narrowed immediately: he knew something was different about his friend, he wasn't always so... cheerful. He usually had a kind of disappointed scowl on his face- luxuries disappointment was what Jake usually called it because Jayden's dad was a millionaire. Jake had never been told how he had made his money but he guessed through politics and stuff like that... it was a wild guess. Jayden was a very normal boy, except for the fact he grey eyes, Jake had never seen a boy grey eyes before; even with this feature he would stand out in a crowd of, lets say, three people! That's how un-unique he looked, he was very funny when he wanted to be, which wasn't much unfortunately for Jake.

"Fine, actually, better than fine. Fantastic!" That was when Jake realised just how much those words meant.

"Yeah, I'm pretty good too... do you have your timetable? I kind of forgot mine..."

I laughed at his speech. "Duh! I can't remember a day when you didn't forget your timetable." Wordlessly, I pulled my rucksack off my shoulders and begun to unzip it-

Big mistake.

Jayden's eyes narrowed in confusion, and then utter surprise. "Is that a gun!" Immediately, Jake grabbed the timetable and zipped his bag back up again, his face burning with anxiety. _How stupid am I?_ He thought bitterly. He's probably going to tell the whole school that I have a gun in my backpack. One used frequently by the military at that!

"I, um, uhhh," Jake mumbled, unsure of what to say. He looked Jayden, expecting him to start running around the school shouting his secret to the world, but instead, all he did was casually cross his arms and eye him suspiciously.

"I'll repeat my question, why do you have a gun Jake?" he said, and suddenly, Jake could see a vicious emotion in his eye, one he had never seen in the eyes of someone before. All of a sudden, Jayden looked a whole lot more deadly. But, he didn't have to answer because the bell for their first lesson rang almost simultaneously with when Jake opened his mouth. The ginger-haired boy muttered an apology to Jayden and dashed of into the mass of kids, but he couldn't stop remembering that killing look in Jayden's eye... Shaking his head to try and almost rid himself of the memory, he checked behind, to see if Jayden was following him. Immediately, he scolded himself! _Why would Jayden be following me?_

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**Author's Note: That concludes Chapter One of Walking on Thunder! Like it? Hate it? Tell me your thoughts, all types of criticism are welcome.**


	3. Chapter 2

**Authors Note: Chapter Three is finally here! Thank you to all the people who reviewed, it means a lot to me.**

* * *

Jayden disappeared down the alley, but this time, Jake wouldn't let him get away. His eyes narrowed as he dashed across the street and onto the pavement opposite, a few people shouted protest as he pushed past them, but really, at that moment, he couldn't care less. Fusion Street was so large that Jake had lost Jayden amongst the crowd three times that week, he wasn't going to do that again. Ever since Jayden had seen his semi-automatic, Jake had been following him home to his house every day: he had guessed that somehow, Jayden was tied up in all this business with the gangs. He had no idea how, but the look in Jayden's eyes when he had discovered the gun in his bag made him scared, suspicious and curious at the same time. He knew Jayden was involved, he just knew it!

It was only when he got across to the alley Jayden had entered a few seconds ago did he realise that the alley separated the Truhden Bank from the general store. Jake's eyes narrowed, what was all this about? Why was Jayden coming home? Perhaps his dad said he would pick him up here... in a dingy back-street, no way! There was more to this. He stepped forward and was about to follow when suddenly, the bulky shape of a man hit him. Dazed, Jake stepped back to look at his attacker. He was a man in thirties, dark black hair covered his temple with shades looking his eyes. Wearing a suit and if he had a gun in his pocket, he would look like some kind of agent from MI6 in a James bond movie. "I'm sorry, no entry here." The mans voice was gravelly and full of contempt, as if he thought he could be doing much better things- which he probably could.

"You let my friend through," Jake said, genuinely confused. He eyed the man's shirt, on it, he could a little emblem. He couldn't read it because of the distance between them and the sun, but he thought he made out the word Dark.

"And who is your friend?" he said quickly, as if he was concerned.

'His name's-" suddenly remembering he was talking to a complete stranger, he said, "his name is Grey." He didn't know why he said that, but in school days, he had often heard a few girls and boys that he seemed to hang around with call him Grey.

Immediately, "Dark", eyes widened. He turned away and spoke into the shadows, like he was talking a ghost. Jake picked a few of the words he was saying. "Go and tell Grey that a guy on the street is looking for him."

What? Did, did this guy know Jayden? Almost simultaneously, Dark turned around and spoke with more conviction. "I'm sorry, but you have to leave."

"Why? My friend is in the-" Jake never got to the end of his sentence, because he felt an agonising pain in his shoulder, and immediately, he dropped to the floor...

**On the top floor of the Truhden Bank.**

An attractive young woman with silver blue hair eyes opened her eyes slowly as she heard the sound of the lift. Stepping into the room was her deputy, Red. He looked slightly alarmed. "Blue, Dark's just darted a civilian!"

Instantly, she was on her feet, anger rising from her face. "WHAT? I told Dark, that stupid _git."_ Her hand disappeared to a draw in her desk, and clutched in her fingers emerged an stylish Auto-Mag weapon. "When I get my hands on him!" She ran forward, pushing Red out of the way. He leaped forward worriedly and only just got into the lift before it started to disappear down.

He heard the familiar sound of Blue loading her weapon. He turned to her alarm. "You, you're not going to shoot Dark are you?"

There was a pause before she spoke quietly, "I might." And that was it. Red's eyes turned to the floor and he started tapping the metal with his feet. He knew that Dark had a tendency to be dramatic, but this was a whole new level. Darting a civilian couldn't he comprehend just how much trouble he could get the Gang of Thunder into if someone saw him! Red hoped that no one had seen him... almost exactly the same thoughts were going blue's mind. Perhaps with a more violent edge to them. The next few moments were agony for Red: he knew Dark was going to get seriously punished. Emotionally or psychically- maybe both!

When the doors opened, Blue stepped into the room first. It was comfortable room, not luxury, but a room all the same. On the wall there was a sign that read, "Prisoner's Floor." Blue seemed to be just more angered by this and she moved straight towards a frightened Dark. The senior warrior was guarding the room to the left were a young thirteen year old lay. Like lightning, Blue's hand snapped forward and struck him across the face! The force of the blow sent Dark stumbling away, whimpering. "WHAT THE HELL DID YOU THINK YOU WERE DOING?"

"I, Blue, Tiger told me to-" Dark began, flinching.

"Do you think I give a damn what Tiger said?" Blue screeched. She turned around to see Red looking at her in shock; immediately she started to calm down. "You know how dangerous rash dicisions like that are, what do you think could happen..." she trailed of with a distant look in her eye.

Suddenly, a new voice entered the conversation. "Wha, where am I?" All three turned around to see Jake emerging from the shadows, looking confused.

"Ah yes," Dark suddenly started to smile. "What would you say Blue, when you found out that this boy happened to be armed?"

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**Please review!**


	4. Chapter 3

**Walking on Thunder CF**

Jake started to sweat, _no, no, this is not good._ He stared helplessly at the people around him, just waiting for one of them to bring out a gun and fire. It was obvious this Blue woman was leader of one of the gangs, and Dark was probably one of her main lieutenants. They both looked battle trained and ferocious; the slap Blue had inflicted upon her own lieutenant was enough to send Jake flying across the room.

Blue raised an eyebrow, and it was more curious than anything. "A gun?"

"Yes, Blue," Dark said smugly, taking Jake's semi-auto from his pocket. "A gun more commonly used by the Gang of Water." He tossed the gun over to Red, who handed it to Blue. "Browning Hi-Power, semi-automatic, fired recently." Dark turned to Jake, his eyes narrowed. "Trying to infiltrate The Gang of Thunder's complex, I presume?"

Jake's eyes flickered towards the window for just a second, and then back- hang on a sec, I'm still on Fusion Street, which means- one of the gangs headquarters has been right in front of the press' noses all this time! "Your base is on Fusion Street?" he said, slightly dazed.

Dark shoved his face into mine, knocking me over. "Obviously," he growled. Jake gasped when Dark lashed out, sending a vicious kick into my stomach. He choked, feeling sick.

"Stop it Dark," Blue shouted, giving the gun back to Red. "He's no use to us dead." Dark turned around to look at his leader in disbelief... that was when Jake saw his chance. There in Dark's pocket there lay the handle of his _own_ pistol. The boys hand shot out almost automatically, grabbing the gun from the pocket and holding it straight up towards my captors head. "Back away." I ordered.

Dark, Blue and Red looked at me, slightly amused.

"BACK AWAY!" I shouted. "Or I'll shoot." I cocked it for good measure and tilted the barrel of the revolver until it pointed towards the door of the room. Blue's eyes widened slightly.

"There you are!" Dark said, almost triumphantly. "What more proof do you need? No normal kid would think of taking my gun, no one, except for a kid being trained by the gangs." He stared at Blue, but she looked thoughtful.

By now, Jake was getting extremely impatient. "Come on, move. MOVE." I slowly got to my feet. "I will shoot, rest assured." Slowly, and reluctantly, Dark and Red started to back away towards the elevator. I gestured for them to put their hands in the air, and slowly, with the same reluctance, they did. It was almost funny really, two men that looked about the age of twenty, fully battle trained, being shown up by a child who had no idea how to use the gun he was holding. Blue, however, was the only one who had noticed this. She had seen the unwillingness in my eyes and the slight shake of Jake's hand as he held the revolver. Nobody trained by the gangs would act like this under pressure. What just added to her certainty that Jake was not going to fire was that... his hair. When the late afternoon sun beams shone down onto his ginger hair, it was like his head was on fire. And she remembered very clearly the prophecy that Spot had foretold a few nights ago. Would someone destined to save the Gang of Thunder shoot one of their warriors? Blue started to walk slowly towards Jake, slyly, but with caution. Red and Dark stared on, interested to watch Blue's plan of action. Not only did it surprise them, but Jake also. He suddenly felt intimidated by Blue's movements. "Back away," he said, less confident in his speech. Blue just walked closer. "Back away," he said again, thrusting the revolver towards her.

"No," Blue purred. "I don't think you have the guts to pull that trigger." Jake didn't answer; Blue carried on. "I think I'm in charge now." Quick as a bolt of lightning, she reached down to her gun holster, and pulled out an Auto-Mag pistol, glinting in the sun. The two stared at each other for a moment, both guns raised. "Drop the gun," Blue said softly. Jake did so without hesitation... and when the weapon hit the floor, it was almost as if Jake had lost all hope of survival.


End file.
